The Fire Mage DPS Guide, Watch Them Burn!

The Fire Mage DPS Guide: Burn ‘em All!

Updated for Warlords of Draenor

Warlords, like all expansions and most big patches changes things up for mages, but not in a huge way. You get ten more levels, a new talent row, some perks, you’ve lost a few abilities and gained a couple others. All in all Fire looks to be in good shape in Warlords of Draenor, you won’t even have to change your rotation much.

Fire Contents

This Fire Mage guide is primarily intended for use at level 100. However, the principals will still apply during the leveling process. If you’re looking for advice on leveling your Mage, check out our Mage Leveling Guide.

If you want the same in-game step by step leveling guide that we use to get to level 100 as fast as possible, take a look at our favorite, updated for Warlords, in-game leveling guide.

Fire Mage DPS Talents

There have been a few talent changes in Warlords, plus some talents are only available to you and not the other specs (and the reverse is also true.)

At certain times you might value one talent over another. Keep a stack of Tome of the Clear Mind handy for easy talent switches.

Descriptions are below the image and our picks are checked:

Tier 1, level 15

Evanesce is nice for emergencies. Fade away and, briefly, avoid all attacks. It replaces your Ice Block and is on a much shorter cooldown. Nice for fights where you have to avoid large incoming damage. If that’s what you’re facing then this is your #1 pick. Note that it does not wipe existing effects, which Ice Block does.

Ice Floes for when you really need to cast spells while on the move (which can happen often enough.) Definitely has more DPS value than the others.

Tier 2, level 50

Which one depends one how often damage is coming in and what type it is.

Alter Time lets you replay the last ten seconds, by returning you to the “time” and place you were when you cast it ten seconds ago. Or sooner if you recast it sooner. No longer let’s your replay your buffs and procs. It’s simply for moving back to where you were and avoiding that big hit you just took (or will take in just a moment.)

Flameglow constantly mitigates some damage. It’s a great choice for fights where you anticipate taking constant damage. It won’t make you a tank, but it will make the healer’s (and your) lives a bit easier. It’s also one less button to think about.

Ice Barrier is the “fire and forget” shield. Put it up and forget about it for a minute. Blocks a fair amount of damage. Especially useful in fights where you are suffering from “pushback” or you know there’s a big chunk of damage coming in.

Tier 3, level 45

As this tier is composed solely of CC, take whichever appeals to you most/suits an encounter best.

Ring of Frost is an AoE CC. Freeze several opponents burn them. Nice for patrols or to grab a group. Takes 2 seconds to cast or arm. Can block passageways.

Ice Ward is pretty useless in raiding situations. In other situations where you have to kite something then it’s pretty nice.

Frostjaw is a very nice single target CC/Silence. Use it on that incoming add or tough trash mob casting away. If you need to freeze groups then take Ring of Frost. As it’s your only silence these days you might find some use for it against cast trash.

Tier 4, level 60

Greater Invisibility is an interesting choice for survivability. It removes effects, massively reduces damage, and drops threat, so can be very nice in bad situations, esp. if you know what’s happening before it happens.

Cauterize lets you avoid death, but also sets you on fire, which is actually a much better tradeoff than it might sound. Ice Block removes the burning. Some put this into an “I’m Cauterizing, Heal me Now!” macro and let a healer take care of the damage.

Cold Snap is the only one that can add to your DPS, by resetting cooldowns, and the additional Ice Block, Dragon’s Breath, and the Heal can help survive in some bad situations.

Tier 5, level 75

Living Bomb is best for groups and decent for single targets. It burns the target for 12 seconds and it then explodes and damages the target and nearby mobs.

Unstable Magic causes your Fireball to have a chance to explode on impact, doing extra damage to your target and also to any nearby enemies. Does a bit less overall damage than the others, but it’s also one less item on your bar. Nice for singles or for groups.

Blast Wave is an old ability brought back from the dead. Two charges. Blasts the target for solid damage and the wave blasts all targets nearby for partial damage and also slows them. Nice for fighting groups, #1 for single targets. It comes with two charges so yous can fire a pair back to back, right at the peak of your Incanter’s flow.

Tier 6, level 90

Mirror Image was an ability in Mists and is now a talent. Create three copies of yourself which start blasting away at the target. Massively buffed from its pre-WoD form, especially handy in long fights where you can use it more than once. A nice “burst” cooldown.

Rune of Power is the simplest to use of this tier, seeing as all you have to do is stand in it. Best used on fights with little or no movement. Place the rune(s) and blast away. When glyphed it restore 1% of your health per second while standing in your own rune. This is the choice if you’re able to stay in one place and blast away. If you are not, and you often aren’t, then go with one of the others.

Incanter’s Flow causes your boost to ebb and flow, from a minimum 4% boost to a 20% max, cycling from peak to peak over ten seconds. Try to line up Pyroblast! procs with the peak flow. Stays up until cancelled. This averages out to a 12% damage increase over the entire fight, which isn’t bad. Especially if you’re moving a lot.

Tier 7, level 100

Prismatic Crystal: All specs. Puts a stationary crystal at the targeted location. You attack it and it takes 130% damage from your attacks. Any time it takes damage it instantly releases that damage, splitting it evenly among all enemies within 8 yards. The only issue is if the targets are moving, otherwise it’s very nice. Very close to “Orbital Bombardment” in overall DPS. If you have the Tier 17 4-piece bonus, which gives you instant Pyroblasts and crits, then you need to take this talent.

Orbital Bombardment, er… Meteor: Drops a fraggin’ meteor!! Doing damage to an 8 yard area, also burning the ground doing continuous damage to all who remain in the fire. 3 seconds delay so make sure your targets are stationary when you call for the bombardment.

Fire Glyphs

Glyphs are easily changed, one at a time, with a Tome of the Clear Mind. Swap ‘em as necessary for different fights or to better suit your game.

Glyph of Combustion – More burnination on a longer CD. Increases the duration of your combustion.

Combustion, 45 seconds (1.5 min if glyphed,) Takes the Ignite DoT on a target and creates a new, additional 10 second DoT. Resets Inferno Blast, so use IB right after Combustion to spread effects.

Alter Time, 1.5 min, Returns you exactly as you were when recast or after 10 seconds, including buffs and CDs. Don’t use with CDs longer than the AT duration or you will lose them. Casting it right after a Pyro! proc is a good idea.

Mirror Image, (if you took this instead of Incanter’s Flow) 2 min, dumps aggro and increases DPS. Images inherit crit, haste, and any spellpower that you have. .

Time Warp, 5 min, The mage version of Bloodlust/Heroism and the Core Hound’s Ancient Hysteria. Duplicates them, but does not stack with them. Coordinate with anyone else in your group who has a similar ability.

Defensive Cooldowns

Ice Block, 5 min, Emergency damage mitigation. Ice Block will make you immune to all damage for 10 sec.

Polymorph, 1.7 sec. cast, turns the target into a critter. If glyphed then DOTs will be removed, allowing it to stick. Breaks on damage.

Gems for Fire Mages

Unless a socket bonus offers a nice Intellect or Crit bonus, it’s more effective to gem for pure Intellect/Crit and ignore the bonus. (If your gold stash is feeling a bit inadequate to buy all the gems you need then you should check out our 10 step gold guide.)

Gems with secondary stats have twice the value of gems with primary stats, so your Crit gems are 320 points and your Int gems are 160. This does give some reason to match socket bonuses, though we recommend only doing it if it’s for a nice Int or Crit bonus.

Professions for Fire Mages

In Warlordsall of the professions bonuses (cloak enchants, synapse springs, etc.) are dead, so you might be better served by using the professions to build a larger gold stash.

Blacksmithing will have a few weapons and keys to open locks (so you can kick that Rogue.) Engineering has cool toys and funky mounts. Tailoring, naturally, makes your armor, including pieces to start raiding with.

They get the benefit of Blood Fury, a great burst DPS increaser. Put into a macro.

15% resistance to all stuns with Hardiness, useful in PvP situations and helpful in rare PvE content. This works out to a 1 second decrease from a 6 second stun.

Undead – Small DPS boost from Drain Life.

“Will of the Forsaken” can wipe off sleeps, charms, etc., a nice ability to have, especially in PvP.

Being able to eat the brains of those you kill frees up a blag slot (which would otherwise carry food.)

Undead passively use drain life which drains life from opponents and heals you for the same amount. This is a passive effect and happens occasionally with your damaging attacks and actually adds something to your overall DPS.

Indefinite Underwater Breathing might have some use somewhere.

Goblin - More DPS with Haste.

Rocket Jump has definite uses at times, especially as “gain range” ability when Blink is on cooldown.

A 1% increase to Haste is nice, and…

An increase in Alchemy skill, along with a greater effect from your own healing potions, is also nice.

Goblins also receive vendor discounts and can summon a personal bank.

Blood Elves – Now with more crit!

Of the Horde races the Blood Elves, are unique in that they have no DPS abilities, as far as Magery is concerned. Their big ability is Arcane Torrent, which can be used to regain some mana and silence nearby casters, though they shouldn’t be nearby anyway. The mana gain is likely to be less useful than it might seem at first glance, due to already high mana recovery.

Fire Mage Videos

Fire Mage “How To” – This has not been updated for 5.2, despite the title, but still has lots of good stuff.

More about Fire, updated for 5.2.

The Fast Fire Mage Leveling Guide

Leveling a Mage or some other class? It’s pretty easy these days, especially with the Mists of Pandaria changes and since Mages excel at destroying things. Still, there are a lot of quests and a incredible number of things to kill. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a bit of expert help in the “where to go and what to do” department?

Zygor’s guide gives you that help, whether you”re Horde or Alliance and regardless of your level, at all times. It’s like having an expert showing you exactly where to go and what to do. It doesn’t matter if you stop your questing to gain a few levels in PvP or the dungeons, you’re brand new to the game, or you’re decked head to toe in heirlooms. Come back to the quests and Zygor will figure out where you should be, based on your new level, and update the guide accordingly. It’ll even let you zap your obsolete quests.

You’re not even locked into any particular build. Zygor’s guide has a talent advisor which will recommend talents regardless of your class or spec. All in all you’ll blast to 90 faster than ever before.

6 Responses to “The Fire Mage DPS Guide, Watch Them Burn!”

I only recall seeing this stat on weapons so far (staffs in particular). It is a shame it cannot be reforged, especially since it is a higher ranking stat. Also I did not see any gems or enchants listed as recommendations for the fire mage to increase spellpower. Do no such gems exist? It may be helpful to note that you can increase your spellpower with a ring enchantment but only if your mage is an enchanter, all the other spellpower enchants do not appear to be as useful as the ones you have recommended. I guess having this stat difficult to increase is part of the challenge of the game. Thank you for your help and all the information this site provides.

You’re right, there aren’t any Cata gems or enchants with Spell Power. There were some level 80 items, and when leveling there are some items that add direct fire damage, but none for Cata or M of P. The Ring enchant only adds 23 Spell Power, so the +40 Int enchant is much better (and M of P won’t add Spell Power either.) As far as stats, my Fire Mage (mostly used in PvP) sticks pretty much with Int and Crit, reforging everything into Crit. Make sure you have your Hit taken care of and you’ll be fine.

As far as difficulty, well, Vanilla WoW was a bit more interesting in the stat game.

Then in the next paragraph under the stats that explains each one, the spellpower stat is completely left out. The information listed goes from 17% Spell Hit to Critical Strike.
The next section is on Reforging. Could you please advise why the spellpower information is not included? Also any information you have to share on the spellpower stat would be greatly appreciated.

Good catch. Spell power is pretty much only available on trinkets and weapons these days (and will be in Mists of Pandaria.) You cannot reforge into SP though, which is a shame. I’ll update the page accordingly.

There is a comment in this thread which refers to 17%, but that’s an old comment. Before M of P is was 17%, now it’s 15% Spell Hit for raid bosses and such, 6% for same level stuff. Any Hit or Expertise on your gear add into the spell hit number, as do certain racials. Draenei Hit, Gnome Sword expertise, etc.

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